Matt Damon, John Krasinski take on fracking debate in 'Promised Land'

Matt Damon couldn't have picked a more controversial backdrop for his latest film.

"Promised Land," which he co-wrote along with "The Office" regular John Krasinski, dramatizes the debate over fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, a method of extracting natural gas that proponents say is safe and opponents say is anything but.

Damon stars in the movie, opening Friday Jan. 4, as a salesman for the fictional energy company Global Crosspower Solutions. Along with an associate (Frances McDormand), he shows up in rural Pennsylvania to persuade members of a financially strapped community to lease the drilling rights to their farmland.

What seems like an easy job for the duo becomes complicated when a schoolteacher (Hal Holbrook) urges his neighbors to read the fine print, and Damon finds himself drawn to a local woman (Rosemarie DeWitt). When a slick environmental activist (Krasinski) arrives, the stakes are raised even further.

As they were writing the screenplay, Damon and Krasinski attempted to represent both sides of the hot-button issue fairly. "It's complex," says Damon, 42. "[Selling leasing rights] is a temporary lifeline to some people.

"But there are potential downstream horrific outcomes. If you believe the energy industry, there are potential downstream benefits that we can't even imagine and geopolitical benefits as well."

Damon got a lesson firsthand in how volatile the issue is when, on the first day of shooting in the western Pennsylvania town of Avonmore, proponents and opponents of the drilling method showed up.

"Some farmers said, 'Is this a movie about fracking? Well, then, you shouldn't say anything bad about it.' There were people from the other side showing up saying, 'Don't say anything good about fracking. It's terrible … It's ruining our water. People are getting sick.'"

Damon insists he didn't set out to make the movie to provide answers but rather to stir up questions.

"[I think of the movie] as a way to start a conversation. At the end, [my character] is saying, 'If you don't get involved in the decision it's going to get made for you,' and that's true.

"But nobody wants to go see a movie where they get a message at the end. That really wasn't our intent. It was just to show this moment in time in our country, and what happens when big money collides with real people, people who are struggling on the back end of a recession."

Fifteen years ago, Damon won a Best Original Screenplay Oscar for "Good Will Hunting," the drama he wrote with his lifelong buddy Ben Affleck. When he began co-writing "Promised Land," he wasn't afraid to tackle some big themes.

"What we really wanted to write about was the American identity," says Damon. "We wanted to look at where we've come from, where we are right now and where we're headed."